Unraveled (29 page)
Authors: Reavis Z. Wortham
The lawmen's cars were positioned the next morning to temporarily block the lanes crossing the Lake Lamar Dam. Ned's shirt was already sticking to his back, telling him it was going to be another miserable day. Despite the heat and humidity, he felt better after catching a few hours of sleep.
John, Anna, and Cody joined him at the twisted guardrail to hear Anna's theory about the car crash and resulting clash between the two families. She pointed at the highway only twenty feet away from the damaged rail. “See that tire mark?”
Cody used his foot to point. “This curved one here?”
“Right. Those short skidmarks from Maggie's car are back there, and there are two of them. This is where someone peeled out on a motorcycle.”
Ned studied the scars on the slope below and then looked up to see his house a mile in the distance. He unconsciously scanned the horizon and stopped when he saw the roof of Cody's house.
“My Lord.”
John heard the tension in his voice. “What, Mr. Ned?”
“It's as plain as the nose on my face.” Ned pointed. “John, that there's the roof of Cody's house in them trees and there's mine on the hill over yonder.”
“So?”
Anna agreed. “That's my point. Calvin Williams was sitting here in the dark on his bike, watching y'all's houses. It was late. Maggie and Frank came around at a high rate of speed. She instinctively tried to dodge him and instead of taking to a ditch, they went through the rail. That mark's from where he peeled out and was gone.”
Ned's voice was soft, as if he were trying to sneak up on the answer that he already knew. “She's right, but that still don't explain what
they
were doing together.”
She pointed to the wooded overlook. “You can park against the trees and nobody can see you. My guess is they spent most of the night right there, talking. They could have been having sex, or arguing, or both for all I know, but from what I've heard, they'd probably decided to be together because Maggie was pregnant.”
Anna spoke softly, eyes almost closed as if she could see that night. The dam was silent. A hawk rode the thermals above the woods lining the creek. “She started to have an abortion in Frogtown, but changed her mind.” She saw Ned's eyebrow rise. “Miss Sweet sent Ralston to bring her back. Miss Sweet told John, and I talked to some other women, so I know it's true.”
Cody faced the west in the direction the car was traveling. “So Frank and Maggie's accident was just that, an accident that came at the worst possible time. But I'm still wondering why his car was at a joint across the river. No one there saw them.”
“'cause that's a good place to leave one.” John thought aloud. “Maybe they just pulled up out there at the edge of the lot and he got in with her.”
Anna thought about it. “It fits. I doubt people recognized a car from Chisum sitting out there in the dark. They were probably going to go back and get it before daylight, but almost ran into Calvin instead. Good Lord. He had no idea who they were at first, but when he found out, he used the wreck to restart this feud and tried to put the blame on Cody. At the same time
we
got locked into who they were. It led us to concentrate on the wrong set of events.”
She watched their reactions. “It was brilliant. Once we get all this sorted out, I think we'll find that he was behind some of the fires, in addition to the murders of Merle Mayfield, Joe Bill, and if I'm right, Hollis Mayfield.”
Ned rubbed the back of his neck, digesting her theory. The puzzle pieces fell into place and they all fit when he realized why Calvin had been on the dam in the first place. “He was settin' here, Cody, stewing on you and Norma Faye, I 'magine. Y'all might have been next, or if he hadn't got caught here that night, first.”
Cody's eyes roamed over the house and woods. “If y'all are right, Calvin'll might try to come to the house.”
John shook his head. “That guy's most likely gone for good.”
“But we don't know that. If Maggie'd hit him, none of the rest of this would have happened.” Cody hooked both thumbs behind his gunbelt. “But she didn't and he got away. Anna, you done good. This explains almost everything.”
“Except where Calvin Williams is now,” Ned said.
Cody drew a long breath. “All right. Let's get back to what we were doing and see if we can't run him down. We need to find him now more than ever.”
They started back to the cars when John pointed. “Sheriff, your car's leaking oil.”
Cody squatted and looked underneath. Oil dripped like water. “Dammit. Looks like the oil pan's got a hole in it. Look at the size of that puddle.”
Ned's stomach rumbled, reminding him he'd only had coffee for breakfast. “You think you got enough to get back to town?”
“Maybe. You follow me, though, just in case.”
“You bet. I'll bring you back to the house.” Ned faced the creek bottom and the house he'd called home for the past forty years. “Mama'll have dinner ready by then.”
The Wraith couldn't take lying around the Oklahoma motel room any longer. His head throbbed all night from where Ike Reader split his scalp with the shovel and he added Reader to his now short list of people to settle up with.
The urge to do something, anything, took over. No one would be looking for him in Center Springs. Anyone with any sense would think he was long gone from the state. Right
now
was the time to finish his business and go.
He worked the handlebars of his 1949 Indian through the cabin door. Once outside, he tied a red bandanna around his head and put on a pair of sunglasses, figuring it was enough of a disguise to do what he wanted.
He kicked the engine alive and grinned. He had a new plan. Like everyone else in his old community, Ned's family most likely gathered at his house for Sunday dinner. The Wraith decided to ride his bike back into Texas to the Sanders Creek bridge and park it underneath. Then he could follow Center Springs Branch, just like he did the night he slipped into Norma Faye's house, only this time it would be broad daylight.
No one would be there and he could wait for the couple to come home, full of fried chicken and sleepy, and not expecting what they were due. The Wraith pressed his left arm against his chest, feeling the knife under his shirt.
It would be quick and silent. Then he could simply walk back down the stream and ride away. It would all be happy trails after that.
He gunned the engine and rode south, singing the Roy Rogers song. “Happy trails to you⦔
The Wraith crossed the Red River bridge twenty minutes later and into Texas. He turned right onto 197 and glanced into his rearview mirror. A red Plymouth Fury popped up right behind him and he recognized the men in the front seat. “Oh, shit!”
In the passenger seat, Sheriff Cody Parker slapped a red light onto the roof and it came to life.
The Wraith gunned the engine.
His plan had just come unraveled.
The motorcycle accelerated as soon as Ned turned in behind him. He mashed the accelerator and the Plymouth's big engine roared.
“I don't believe it!” Cody slapped a light on the roof and snatched the microphone off the dash. “John! Anna!”
Deputy John Washington came back first. “Cody, what's wrong?”
“We're coming back from dropping my car off and Ned just turned in behind Calvin Williams on that Indian motorcycle. He's on 197 from Arthur City and heading for Center Springs. Where are you?”
“I was nearly to my house.” The sounds of squalling tires came through the Motorola's speaker telling Cody the deputy was making a U-turn. “I'm on the way.”
“Ned!”
“Go ahead, Anna!”
“I'm coming, too.”
“Where are you?”
“Just west of Powderly.”
Ned leaned forward over the wheel and squinted into the distance. “Tell her to come back down the new road across the dam.”
Cody saw the wisdom in the move that would close off all three routes. Williams would have only one option to escape and that would be to take the dirt roads through the bottoms that led nowhere. They'd have him trapped.
Ned grunted. “She shuts that road off, and we'll have him.”
“Did you get that, Anna? Come through Powderly and cut him off at the dam.”
“Got it.”
The Wraith twisted the accelerator, leaning into the curves as he pulled away from Ned's Plymouth. The white Indian jumped forward and roared down the road. He couldn't believe his bad luck! It was the same luck he'd had all his life and he was
tired
of it. He was smarter than everybody else, but John Law was always picking on him, or showing up at the wrong time, or trying to bust him for things that were out of his control. Now here they were again, right on his ass and it just wasn't
right!
After one quick glance over his shoulder, he leaned over the handlebars. He blew around a lumbering truck full of hay. The Wraith shot past the startled farmer and hit the straightaway leading to the creek bridge. He gained distance on the one mile straightaway to the curve around Ned's house.
Past it, the turnoff over the dam was only another mile farther on.
He could take it, cross the lake, and then cut back down Highway 271 for just a minute and disappear into the backroads on the east side. From there he had a dozen options. His best bet was to head for Red River County and cross back into southeast Oklahoma. If he could make it to the gravel and dirt roads in the rugged, undeveloped Kiamichi Mountains, they'd never find him.
The hay truck slowed Ned and he chewed his lip for a few seconds until he could see the oncoming lane. It was clear and he pushed the pedal to the floor.
Cody braced himself with one hand on the dash and the other gripping the door. He knew the old constable was a good driver, but when he glanced at the speedometer as they hit the Sanders Creek straightaway, the needle was pegged at 120 miles per hour. “Careful, Ned.”
“You want to drive?”
“Yes.”
“Well, we don't have time to switch.”
“Then why'd you
ask
me?”
“'cause you wanted me to.”
Ahead, the motorcycle's taillight flickered as he slowed to round the curve past Ned's house.
Cody keyed the microphone. “He passed Ned's house. If he don't take the oil road to the bottoms, he'll be in Center Springs in half a minute. John, cut him off.”
“Nearly there.”
The thick air was so still that I could hear a motorcycle coming over the creek bridge. It was whining loud and coming fast. A car was winding out behind it and I thought some teenagers were racing. I limped across the living room and went out on the front porch. Pepper and Mark followed me.
From the edge, we could see down the straightaway from the bridge. Mark whistled. “Man! That bike's
moving
!”
Pepper grabbed a porch post and leaned out to see better. “I hope he knows this curve's coming up.” Her hair hung down as she tilted her head to see around the brushy Bois d' Arc tree at the bottom of the curve. “If he don't, he's gonna wind up in that bodark or Gary Halpin's raggedy-assed barbed-wire fence.”
Mark pointed. “Look! That's Grandpa's Plymouth chasing that guy! Look at him go! Whooee! He's a driving son-of-a-gun. I never woulda thought it.”
The pitch of the motorcycle's engine changed as he slowed to take the bend. We lost him for a second at the bottom of the hill and then he shot out past the house, leaning into the S-curve and accelerating even faster toward Center Springs.
“Son of a bitch!”
I heard a crack and turned to see Miss Becky'd whacked Pepper on the back of the head. “You watch your language on the Sabbath, young lady.”
She mouthed “shit” and rubbed her head as Grandpa came around the curve, tires squalling. “Mark said son-of-a-gun.”
“Well, that ain't really cussin'. You keep a civil tongue.”
The back end almost broke on the Plymouth below the house and the tires squealed, but he steered into it and his engine roared again as the road straightened. He shot past and we had time to see Uncle Cody in the passenger seat, talking into the Motorola's microphone.
Mark turned to look at me. “Man! Someday I'm gonna be a lawman.”
I liked the idea. “We can be partners, deputies.”
Pepper rolled her eyes. “Oh, puhleeze.”
Movement caught my attention behind Pepper and I saw Norma Faye's eyes were watery again. “That's Calvin. They said he got away on an Indian motorcycle.” Her voice broke into deep sobs when she turned from the door and went back inside with Miss Becky behind her.
The three of us stayed on the porch to listen as the car's tires whined away toward Center Springs on the hot concrete.
Cody keyed the mike again. “He's past the cutoffs to the bottoms and headed your way, John. Can you catch him before he gets to Oak Peterson's store?”
“I ain't there yet. Got behind Ike Reader and a trailer full of cows. If Williams gets to Center Springs before me, he might take to that oil road past the Ordway place. If I miss him, it'll take him around behind me and I won't even know it 'til I get there.”
“Do your best. Anna, where are you?”
“Off the highway and almost to the dam. I have him cut off on this side.”
There weren't any roads branching off that one. “Don't let him get around you, gal.”
“Don't worry about that.”
John's voice came back through the speaker. “Coming into Center Springs. I don't see him. He might have cut off before the post office and headed to the bottoms that way.”
Cody started to tell him that didn't happen, because they could see the bike ahead when John came back through. “There he is!”
The radio was silent for a moment, and the two lawmen held their breath as wooden fenceposts flashed past in a blur. John's voice came through. “He turned toward the lake. He damn near lost it when he saw me. Anna, he's heading your way. Ned, look out!”
